PATHS

PATHS® is a programme that is taught from Reception to Year 6. PATHS® stands for Promoting Alternative Thinking Strategies and it helps children recognise and understand different feelings. It teaches children how to deal with different feelings and provides children with calming down strategies and it also helps them to solve problems with their friends.

Take a look on the Birmingham City Council website for more information by following the link below.

PATHS® is a big part of Gilbertstone; everyday a child is picked from each class to be the PATHS® child, where they will carry out special jobs and get to receive compliments from their friends and teachers at the end of the day. The children love taking part in PATHS® lessons and our parents get chance to get involved through workshops and parent awareness courses.

Have a look at the exciting things that have taken place with PATHS® in our school.

PATHS® Lead School

We are so proud at Gilbertstone to receive our award for being a PATHS® lead school. We received the award in recognition of our high quality implementation of the PATHS® curriculum across our school. Going to London to receive this award with the PATHS® team was a proud moment for us all!

PATHS® Workshops

In Reception we have PATHS® workshops every year. This is a great opportunity for our parents to find out all about PATHS® and how it can be used at home. They also get chance to take part in PATHS activities with their child. It is lots of fun!

PATHS® Pupil Conferencing
We have carried out pupil conferencing to find out what our children think of PATHS® and how we can improve PATHS® at Gilbertstone. The reposnses from children has been positive and they have thought of some great ideas on how to improve PATHS®. We have a special sash and tabbard that the PATHS® child of the day wears and in KS2 there is a special pencil case they can use. These were all fabulous ideas from our children.

PATHS® Displays

In every classroom we have a PATHS® display and in KS1 each year group has their own PATHS® area. Have a look at some of our great displays below.

PATHS® Parents Awareness Course

Our KS1 parents/carers are invited to attend the PATHS® Parent Awareness Course every year to increase their knowledge about PATHS® and help them with supporting their children and families at home with a range of feelings and emotions. The course is led by a PATHS coach each week who talks to the parents about how children’s feelings and emotions develop. Mrs. Draper & Mrs. Cunningham support on the course too. The course gives parents/carers the opportunity to work alongside their child creating a resource used for PATHS® each week. Over the six week course the parents/carers and their child create a range of resources to use at home with their families, such as a poster of house rules for home, compliments stars & a feelings flower. The course also includes problem solving and calming down techniques by using turtle or steps to calming down control signals. The parents/carers also make a problem solving box with their child to use with the family too.

All the parents/carers that take part enjoy sharing ideas and personal experiences with each other each week over a coffee and a biscuit. Please look out for the posters with the next course dates that are available in the Spring Term and come and join us here in the Hub at Gilbertstone, Places are limited so let us know in advance if you are interested.

Here are a few photographs of the parents/carers currently taking part on the course. Some parents/carers like to come back and join us again so both their children in KS1 have the chance of this special time with them or it has just been so enjoyable and worthwhile they have taken part again.

Here are a few comments that parents / carers have made after attending the course:

"I want to do this course again. I Loved it. Thank You."

"PATHS course should keep running and more parents should be aware and attend."

"I would love to do the course all over again."

"I'm really impressed and happy to see that PATHS is used so well in school. I think PSHE is fundamental in school. All parents should get more information."

PATHS® Parents Awareness Course

Here is one of our PATHS® coaches in action on parents evening here at Gilbertstone. Neesa was brilliant at making our parents / carers aware of PATHS® in our school. We hope you all enjoyed stopping and having a chat with Neesa along with collecting some information about PATHS®. Thank you Neesa!

PATHS® Achievements

Here are the children who have completed the PATHS® Parent Awareness course recently receiving their certificates in assembly with Mrs O'Reilly. The resources they have made look fantastic! Congratulations!

Here are the children and their parents receiving their certificates from Mrs. Crosskey for completing the PATHS® Parent Awareness course this term.

Thank you for taking part and well done to you all!

PATHS® Video

Take a look at the Vimeo link below and see a clip of our previous PATHS® Parent Awareness courses along with footage of our parents and staff with Mrs Crosskey talking about the impact of PATHS® in our school.

Here are a few photos from our Parent Awareness course this term. Our plans for next year are to hold a KS2 Parent Awareness course during the Winter term along with a Reception / KS1 Parent Awareness course in the Spring / Summer term. Please let us know if you would like to take part and learn more about PATHS® with your child.

PATHS Parent Awareness Course - 2016

Last year we ran two successful Parent Awareness courses which included children from Reception, KS1 & KS2 with their parents/carers. Anna our PATHS coach received some outstanding positive comments and feedback about the course from our parents/carers.

Here are a few of the comments made in response to Anna’s questionnaire along with a few photos of the parents/carers with their children from the June/July 2016 course.

“Anna is fantastic at presenting and very approachable.”

“Sharing time with my child in school and ideas for activities out of school.”

“It is good to know how school teaches the children PATHS. We can now do PATHS at home too.”

Our next Parent Awareness course with Anna starts on Friday 13 January 2017. We have a few parents/carers who have booked their places already. Please come and see us if you are interested in taking part with your child to learn more about PATHS.

A massive well done and thank you to all those parents/carers along with their children last year for taking part on the course.